Month: April 2012

Most manga can be divided into two sections, one for boys, and the other for girls. This is a shojo manga that caters to older teenage girls who like humour, emotion and an intriguing plot.

The story is about Junior High School student Miaka Yuki, who has started to read The Universe of the Four Gods, where she takes the lead role, the god Susaku’s priestess. Her role is to gather the seven celestial warriors of Suzaku. This will have her complete the quest to save Hong-nan, and will also give her permission to have a wish granted. During her quest, she has to find four noble warriors; Hotsohari, Nunko, Tamahome, and the monk Chichiru. But Miaka was not alone in her quest, a fellow student Yui was drawn in to the book and its world but she had been hurt badly by her experiences and her rage had caused her to hate Miaka, and that turned her into her enemy for life.

Miaka has to search for the remaining warriors, but Qu-Dong starts to invade Hong-Nan, and their enemies want Tamahome to be given to them if they don’t want another dark war. This puts them in a difficult situation, and the other members of the court know there is something underhand going on in the enemy land.

The whole story shows the sort of life the characters would have had at court and out of it, and how they differ. War can be avoided, but it can start just as easily if one or both parties do not agree with what happens.

The manga is quite a unique one as it is divided into two worlds, the present and the past, and the past has characters in beautiful Chinese period costumes and finery that must have taken the artist hours to create. It is a period look, but the artist has made it into her own style, which readers will appreciate.

Fushigi Yugi is a very decorative and detailed manga offering, but that is normal for shonen manga like this. It will appeal most to girls who like to read about a fantasy land in their spare time.

In a world where Australia gets a movie a week and a half prior to the United States, it only makes sense that it could be a world where a movie so hyped could still surpass expectation, and then some.

The Avengers is, for me and in no uncertain terms, the best comic book movie I’ve seen.

In a world where Australia gets a movie a week and a half prior to the United States, it only makes sense that it could be a world where a movie so hyped could still surpass expectation, and then some.

The Avengers is, for me and in no uncertain terms, the best comic book movie I’ve seen.

I’ve read a lot of comics, and among them have been a lot of Avengers comics. I really enjoy reading The Avengers, because I like the team dynamic and the way in which they appear to be friends behind the shields and masks.

Watching The Avengers – directed by geek-superstar Joss Whedon – was like watching a comic play out in front of me. There was everything you could have hoped for as a fan; friendships, action, team dynamics, action, humour, and a bit more action.

There was a lot of concern over how this movie would end up blending together the storylines of four separate movie franchises without it turning into a mess. That’s where the 142 minutes this movie runs comes into play. There were two distinct portions of the movie where we saw a coming together of the franchises and their respective stars, before the movie merged into one seamless action scene that all but flashed the words “Avengers Assemble” up on the screen.

And that is not to say that the first portion of the movie wasn’t itself seamless, it was just a necessary blending of previous movies and personalities.

Those who were worried about the role that the two non-powered heroes – Hawkeye and Black Widow – would play should fret no longer. Both characters are used exactly as they should be and they compliment the rest of the team perfectly, completing tasks that the big-hitters simply would no have been able to.

It would be retreading ground to address the actors performances as their titular characters, as they’ve already had their own movies. But the introduction of Hawkeye (who really only had a small part to play in Thor), Maria Hill, and the return of Agent Phil Coulson fill out an already fantastic character sheet.

The “best comic book movie” descriptor is going to be thrown around a lot, and I don’t expect everyone to think the same way I do. But I do hope that it conveys just how much I enjoyed this movie. If you haven’t seen it yet, stop whatever you are doing and go! Trust me, you won’t regret it.

The Bookseller Industry Awards is now in its third year. The aim of the awards is to celebrate the very best of publishing, retailing and libraries. This year there is an entirely new category, for academic, educational and professional publishers. In total, there are 17 categories.

The 2012 Shortlist

Imprint and Editor of the Year sponsored by The Publishing Training Centre

May 1st will see the release of the fourth book in the Demon Squad series – Echoes of the Past. Leading up to this event, author Tim Marquitz has been kind enough to provide us with the cover art and short excerpt from his new book. You can find out more information at his website here. Enjoy.

I could feel the power emanating off the figure as it watched me from outside. The drunks weren’t the only thing scrambling for the rear exit.

Human-ish, but formed entirely out of mystical energy, the figure—which I guessed was a specter, a spirit leashed and turned semi-tangible—had the body of a man but the head of a Jackal. Dressed in Egyptian garb, flowing Schenti leggings and sandals, it was naked from the waist up except for an ankh-shaped necklace that looked like it was made out of poorly hammered gold with an outline of green gems. It carried an oaken and decorated staff that it held at the ready. The specter looked vaguely familiar, but damned if I could place it beyond its general mythos. It was Anubis or Set; one of the puppy gods.

A low growl rumbled from its throat. It hovered a couple feet off the ground, but the specter probably stood about six feet and change. Thin and wiry, it crooked its fingers at me to draw me out.

“Do you work for the DSI?” I asked.

Another blue fireball was my answer. Since I saw it coming this time, it was easier to avoid. I ducked low and dove toward the window. The magical energy flew past and exploded behind me, engulfing what was left of the bar in shimmering blue flames. Fortunately, everyone had taken my advice. The place was empty.

“Was that a yes or a no?” I couldn’t recall having pissed off any Egyptians recently, so I was more than a little curious why Mutzilla was trying to take my head off.

I rolled through the wreckage and leapt out the empty window frame as the specter hurled more fire about. In the street, I ducked behind a parked car and cast a quick glance around. The specter followed.

Downtown was a graveyard. Baalth’s premature incineration and the recent storms had the whole town spooked. At the first hint of supernatural hijinks, everyone within spitting distance disappeared; except for me, of course. At least that meant I’d be the only one to die if I didn’t take the specter out. That was just one more heroic quote in a long line of possible epitaphs waiting to be engraved on my headstone. Whoever buried me was going to have a hell of a time choosing one.

The roof of the car went up in flash, black smoke swirling as the vinyl top burst into flame. Once more I jumped away, my eyes scanning for anyone else who might be around before I was forced to engage the spirit. No more than puppets, specters were the equivalent of a supernatural video game. Whoever summoned it, and held its leash, controlled its actions. More often than not, the summoner was the weaker of the pairing, the energy needed to tether the spirit but a fraction of that possessed by the specter.

People with real power didn’t often hide behind such magical parlor tricks. Why send a poodle to do a pit bull’s job? That said, I couldn’t risk get caught up tangling with the spirit. It only takes a little bit of concentration to control, so, while I was busy scrapping with the sock puppet, I could be taken out by its master.

As quick as I could, I unleashed my senses, but the specter didn’t give me time to decipher anything. Its wooden staff whistled in the air above and I just barely got out of the way. It clacked against the asphalt, a burst of heat following in its wake. The blacktop bubbled, drops of scalding tar flung about as the specter whipped its staff back to ready.

I grinned. At range, tossing fireballs at me, the specter could have kept me on the defensive, giving me the hot foot until it wore me down. Up close, that was a different matter. Certain I couldn’t hurt with my bare hands, it was time to improvise. Still a novice with my newfound magical powers, I didn’t have a lot of experience at using them on the fly. Fortunately, magic is all about imagination and willpower, and I‘ve plenty of both.

Falling back on what I do know, I closed on the specter and threw a left hook, right straight combo, willing my power to envelop my hands like mystical boxing gloves. Well, more like comfy-fitting cinderblocks. My left crashed into the specter’s jaw. It felt like punching a ’57 Chevy, but its head snapped to the side, and it stumbled back a step. My right caught it flush on its cheek and sent it flying.

The staff flew from its hand and vanished in a crackle of energy as the specter hit the ground. The spirit slid a few feet across the asphalt, roaring as it dug its fingers into the blacktop and brought itself to a stop. Before it could get back up and resume its ball-tossing, I followed after it. A shield of energy encasing my right foot, all the way up to the knee, I soccer kicked the specter in its head. My shin went numb when it hit, a crack of thunder sounding at impact.

I struggled to keep my balance as the specter was flung into the air, shrieking. It tumbled head over heels, about ten feet up, but the thing wasn’t out just yet. With nothing resembling aim, it loosed blue fire from its hands, eyes, and mouth. Tendrils of power spewed in every direction like a teenage boy experiencing his first erection. Too much magic being flung about, I ducked behind a car to wait it out. I heard the meaty thump of the specter hitting the ground, but the assault continued.

All around me the street was taking an ass-whuppin’. Bolts of energy tore into the nearby buildings, blasting through stone and cement. Windows shattered across the block, a storm of rock and glass showering all around. It felt like I was romancing a fire ant mound, millions of fiery bites erupting across my skin. Car alarms screeched, adding to the avalanche din of collapsing building facades.

It didn’t take me but a second to realize I couldn’t just sit back while the specter leveled the block. I threw a shield over me like an umbrella, and jumped from behind the car. The specter was getting to its feet, a feral grin on its wolfen face. It clearly had no intention of stopping its barrage, though it seemed intent on zoning in on me.

Wishing I had my gun, though not really sure it could even hurt the thing, I improvised. I flung a fistful of magic at the specter, willing it to explode like jagged buckshot. Sharp spears of power ripped through the specter and drove it back on its heels. It crashed into the crumbling wall at its back, bringing pieces of it down around it. The specter growled and swatted the falling debris away. That gave me all the time I needed.

My fist once more encased in energy, I shaped it into the form a spike and threw an overhand right with everything I had. The spirit looked up at me as I closed. I sunk the point into its widened eye. My hand tore through its skull and the specter vanished in a disappointing crackle of energy. The spirit gone, my fist crashed into the building, and sank in to the shoulder. Unable to stop my momentum, I looked away just before the wall scraped away a couple layers of skin from my cheek and chin.

The Dark Knight Rises, the much-anticipated final chapter in writer-director Christopher Nolan’s film trilogy featuring the legendary DC Comics character Batman, will be adapted into an official tie-in novel written by award-winning author Greg Cox and published by Titan Books, under a licensing agreement with Warner Bros. Consumer Products.

Novelist Greg Cox is no stranger to Batman or the DC Comics Universe, having written the official novelizations for such major comic book storylines as Infinite Crisis (2006), 52 (2007), Countdown (2009), and Final Crisis (2010). He has produced numerous bestselling adaptations and original novels based on Star Trek, Underworld, Warehouse 13, and other popular properties. His original novel Terminator Salvation: Cold War won the 2010 Scribe Award for tie-in fiction, and CSI: Headhunter took the award in 2009.

“Batman is one of the most iconic characters of popular culture. We’re tremendously excited to work with Warner Bros. on the novelization of ‘The Dark Knight Rises’, especially since it is the culmination of everything Christopher Nolan has done with his amazing trilogy. This is a part of motion picture history,” commented Titan Publisher Nick Landau.

The publishing of Titan Books’ The Dark Knight Rises is timed to reach consumers worldwide on the same day as the Warner Bros. Pictures release. The Dark Knight Rises opens in theatres on Friday, July 20 while The Dark Knight Rises film novelization will be released on Tuesday, July 24.

Gillian Redfearn of Gollancz has acquired The Far-Called, a three-book fantasy series by Stephen Hunt. The first novel will be called In Dark Service and will be published in 2013.

Hunt is the author of six fantasy novels published by HarperCollins Voyager in the UK and Tor in the US, as well as in various translation editions, and runs the SF Crowsnest news and reviews site.

Plenas has two unique characteristics worth noting, the first – and most significant of which – is that it’s a world on a mind-boggling scale where peddler caravans can take a thousand years to complete a limited circuit of their trade territory, a land where the guild of radio signallers can relay messages between their stations for multiple lifetimes and still never make a clean circumnavigation of the globe.

It is a world where, should a youngster be gripped by wanderlust, they can simply head off and travel with merchant nomads for their entire lifetime, taking in thousands of exotic nations, strange races and mysterious wonders, while still only travelling across a minute fraction of the globe.

The second distinctive facet of Plenas is that the land has no mineral resources worth mining except around the stratovolcanoes dotted across the world, massive shield volcanoes that stand about three times the elevation of Mount Everest above sea level. These vomit out great gobs of ore-bearing rocks into the air for harvesting by sky mines, and this wealth is always jealously hoarded by the empires that rise to pre-eminence around the stratovolcanoes, growing rich with their monopoly over metals, crystals and coals.

Reliance on sustainable resources means that most societies, races and nations on Plenas are throttled somewhere between a Roman and Victorian level of progress, with only the great empires of the stratovolcanoes reaching a higher level of development.

"I’ve always admired Stephen Hunt’s vast imagination, deftness with detail and stunning ideas, and it was a delight to open In Dark Service and find all of that and more. The characters are larger than life, and the adventure is full-screen – I can’t wait to share this story and we are all absolutely delighted to welcome Stephen to the Gollancz list," commented Gillian Redfearn.

"I was knocked out by the concept, but even more so by the darkness and immediacy of Stephen’s writing. I’m delighted that Gillian and the team at Gollancz agreed with me," added literary agent John Jarrold.

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In further news from the John Jarrold Literary Agency John Jarrold was the announcement that the agency now represents all international translation rights of the Grand Master of British horror fiction, Ramsey Campbell. The agency already represented UK and Commonwealth rights.

"I and my sub-agents will be talking to publishers around the world about Ramsey. I have read his work since the sixties, and known him personally since the eighties as a fan, publisher and agent. I am delighted to make this announcement," said Jarrold.